Recent Dr. Strange Sightings

Marvel Team-Up #3 & #4

Part of an ongoing story arc (chapters 3 and 4 of "Golden Child"). Doc detects a massive intrusion into the universe. After discovering a spell to follow the trail, he meets up with the Fantastic Four, who've just been attacked by Dr. Doom, and are about to be attacked again. Battle ensues. Turns out the Dr. Doom from the other dimension is a Human-Torch-scarred Tony Stark. StarkDoom escapes. Strange goes home to read more tomes.

Neilalien's a Robert Kirkman fan. Good stuff. Invincible has been a very satisfying superhero book, and the youthful, bright-color boy-meets-girl Zot! of the age. The Walking Dead has been fantastic, although it seems to be limping lately, it needs a shakeup oomph or some faster pacing or some 'progress' (they don't have to start investigating why the zombies appeared or anything; and maybe come to think of it the horrible lack of 'progress' might be part of the book's hopeless-survivor theme). Still, the book's feeling droppable of late (or at least Neilalien will move to just TPBs), but we'll see how the prison storyline plays out. Haven't gotten around yet to checking out some of his other work, like SuperPatriot.

But these big Marvel gigs he's snagged up to now- the mojo didn't feel there while perusing Captain America in the shop, and for the luvvamike who really wanted more 2099's. Maybe Kirkman held himself back playing with someone else's toys and those big paychecks. But the Kirkman pedigree's still good with Neilalien, Marvel Team-Up was always an old fave, and when Doc's in #3 of a series, Neilalien's a sucker for checking out the series from #1, as he did with She-Hulk (which paid off). And this Marvel Team-Up has paid off too. Kirkman's weaving a good yarn through the Marvel Universe so far (and it might be the only way to get your fix of characters like Moon Knight).

Doc powers: Doc does a nice disappearing trick when StarkDoom's about to punch. StarkDoom's armor has anti-magic properties (like Juggernaut's helm), which is a good idea for limiting what Doc can do to him. He spins a Crimson Bands of Cyttorak, but can't fully envelop StarkDoom before he explodes the whole city block. But even then, Doc teleports everyone to safety.

Kolins' art is pretty sweet. Neilalien thought the pencils would be a little too slight and choppy for his tastes, but there's some fun storytelling here.

So it's a good Doc appearance. Overall, Neilalien's been enjoying "Golden Child" and will be reading the arc to its conclusion. Maybe Doc will return from reading his books.

Ultimate Spider-Man #70 & #71

Ultimate Dr. Strange comes back, after his introduction in Ultimate Marvel Team-Up. If you recall, this Doc version is a kiddie version just starting out in his mystical career, the son of a white-trashy Clea and a missing Dr. Strange that's pretty much the standard Doc. (There's a three-page origin story here that's just the right length.) Peter and kiddie Ben Urich visit Doc for a Bugle interview- Wong brushes them away mysteriously as spidey-senses tingle. Spider-Man investigates, and interrupts Wong trying to save an unconscious Doc. Doc was under the spell of the Ultimate version of Nightmare, one mean lady- and now that's his trip's been interrupted, Spidey's in the wacky nightmare realm now, until Doc goes back in to rescue him.

This story has a couple things going against it from Neilalien's perspective. He's got very little interest in the Ultimate Universe or this kiddie Doc or seeing another goddamn origin or revamp for this character. Plus, spells that are just mumbo-jumbo words aren't compelling. It doesn't have to be a long Stan Lee poem that could never be said while in full combat. It can be a neat involved magical language, like Harry Potter's Latinesque wand spells at least, but we don't have the time or Grant Morrison or Alan Moore around to build it. And let's just forget Zatanna's backwards-speak. The quick simple spells with funky speech-balloon font from Flight of Bones was great. What we got here, is random ahsldfjkh googlyspit- the cat running across the keyboard. And the battle magic here is just boring energy blasts and shields, and you know how much Neilalien loves that if it's not the Ditko originals (though there are a couple illusions of loved ones used to emotionally manipulate). Eh.

Related: The Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe: Women of Marvel 02005

Notable entries for us Dr. Strange surrender-monkeys and Defenders completists:
Clea: Busiek/Larsen Defenders series info is added
Gaea: Busiek/Larsen Defenders series info is added
Hellcat: info from the Hellcat mini and the Busiek/Larsen Defenders series is added; does "Hellstorm fed her a series of falsehoods" explain away the continuity errors in the Hellcat mini?
Jennifer Kale: Witches-ified
Satana: Witches-ified
Scarlet Witch: "chaos magic" was just her mutant hex powers out of control
Topaz: Witches-ified; "She has taken two separate forms, one Caucasian, one Indian"- that's rich!
Valkyrie: Busiek/Larsen Defenders series info is added, Samantha-Parrington-ized; Brunnhilde dead from recent big Thor events

Dr. Strange not obviously in Ultimates 2 #6 variant cover featuring the Ultimate Defenders [Newsarama]
Looks bad, Doc fans. But if, as rumored, the Defenders are laughingstocks in the Ultimate Universe, than maybe it's okay if Doc's not a part.

Marvel December 02004 month-to-month sales [Pulse] [DC]
Strange sinking like rock, drifting off radars. Neilalien predicts another 15% drop among the people who picked up #3 and thought 'Matrix'.

From a profitability point of view, about 20%, 15-20% of our earnings come from the comic book business. The comic book business of course is very important to us. Not only is it highly profitable. We have about a 35% profit margin on our comic book business and growing very nicely if you look at our track record. But also this is our R&D function. This is where we try out new characters, where we ... rework, re-cosmetize, if you will, other older characters, and try to see what kind of story lines work and so on. The nice thing about the comic book business is, and we publish over 60 titles every month, is we can experiment here and really actually lose very little or no money.

Great to see that the publishing is so profitable. But then, how much of that is due to short-sighted schemes and policies like no-overprint no-returnables. And it's a bummer that our beloved medium is seen as R&D for licensing and other bigger-cash media as opposed to something worthy in itself. Can what works in the direct market microscene right now really be a good indicator of broader success. And it's dubious that there's much going on at Marvel right now that can be called 'experimentation', when it's recosmetizing nostalgia.

What Do Publishers Have To Do To Get You To Try A New Comic? [Pulse]
Sounds like the main factor here is price- the lower the cost the more likely to take a chance experiment on the unknown. Followed by anything that makes the new book less of an unknown (established creators, samples on websites, news/interviews/reviews, etc.), which makes sense.

Starfish

Starfish is a great mini-comic written by Marc Sobel and illustrated by Leigh Gallagher (now of The Witching fame at Vertigo) about a small group of people being treated for eating disorders in a claustrophobic underwater lab called The Egg- and about what strangely happens next after a nuclear holocaust destroys the surface world... Excellent creepy black and white art (the website makes it sound like Gallagher got the Vertigo job based on these pages). 12 pages, 8.5"x5.5", good paper, neatly lettered. There's clearly a lot more story to tell here- Neilalien and any other readers will be curious to see what happens next, and if more about the people and events of the Egg will ever be filled in. Released November 02004. [Autopsy Press] $2.50 Paypal shopping here.

Superhero Comics- The Love/Hate Relationship [Thinking Comics]
We can enjoy the modern mythology of the superhero, and hate 35 market-and-creativity-smothering X-Spider-Bat titles, all at the same time.

Origin stories are boring; dispense with the background info in a couple panels, flashbacks [Yet Another Comics Blog]
If only the braintrust behind Strange had listened.

In addition, you shall be paid participation equal to 10% of the profits derived during your life by Marvel (including subsidiaries and affiliates) from the profits of any live action or animation television or movie (including ancillary rights) productions utilizing Marvel characters. This participation is not to be derived from the fee charged by Marvel for the licensing of the product or of the characters for merchandise or otherwise. Marvel will compute, account and pay to you your participation due, if any, on account of said profits, for the annual period ending each March 31 during your life, on an annual basis within a reasonable time after the end of each such period.

Now if only Steve Ditko at least had a contract like that (but would he have accepted it?). Merchandise not included (settled by jury?! Neilalien advises against- Marvel won't win with Handsome Stan on the stand!), but DVDs are. Marvel plans to appeal. "Profits" can be pretty fuzzy in Hollywood, but Marvel declared profits of $50 million on the first Spider-Man, so maybe that's $5 million for Stan.

02004 Neilalien Awards

The much-hinted long-awaited much-hyped mini-series by J. Michael Straczynski retelling and updating Doc's origin. After the three issues so far, this is looking like a huge disappointment.

Other Notable Dr. Strange Appearance:Avengers #503

The Avengers Disassembled finale. Not bad for the Dr. Strange fans, who get to see Doc kick a little Scarlet Witch butt. But why Bendis would take the big Avengers event of the year and let it be resolved in a total non-Avenger way is curious. Also notable for Doc fandom re: the whole "chaos magic" hullaballoo.

Worst Dr. Strange Appearance:Witches

Doc takes lip from petulant jailbait, does two boring energy blasts, lets the innocent die and the bad guys get away- and he gets knocked unconscious ~again~.

Greatest Hope for Dr. Strange Fans in 02005: New Defenders mini-series by Giffen, DeMatteis and Maguire

Best Comic Book of 02004:Eightball #23 by Daniel Clowes

Whenever Neilalien has talked about this book with his friends (both non-comics and comics)- with the many different angles one could take and the superhero stuff and even technical things like the book's size, use of coloring, use of speech balloons, and the Death Ray very Ditko-esque in design- he's had to be shushed because he's getting too loud for the bar. With great power comes a whole lotta scary.

Some Comic Books That Brought Neilalien Much Joy in 02004:

Sleeper by Ed Brubaker and Sean Phillips
Invincible: best superhero book; by Robert Kirkman and Ryan Ottley (and great Bill Crabtree colors)
She-Hulk: best Marvel Universe book; by Dan Slott and Juan Bobillo (gots to be Bobillo)
Smax by Alan Moore and Zander Cannon
Runners by Sean Wang
Less Than Heroes by David Yurkovich
Wanted by Mark Millar and JG Jones

The Losers spared the cancellation axe for the moment [The Beat]
Human Target not so lucky. The direct market claims more victims. Neilalien's gotta pimp more.

Elektra opens today! Neilalien won't be seeing you at the movie theater: he'll likely either be too transfixed by Jennifer Garner's babeness to notice you or his eyes will be closed from wincing at how awful the flick is. Hope it didn't cost them too much to make!

Television commercials for Marvel Comics! [Newsarama]
For the first time since the early '80s. The ad will feature Marvel Adventures Fantastic Four and be part of the build-up to the FF movie.

A Sign Of The Times: Downloading Comics II: The Downloaders [Newsarama]

Two significant steps the industry needs to take re: comics filesharing [Popp'd]
Good books, and get into offering cheap electronic versions early.

DC and Marvel in creative freeze, eating each other like dinosaurs; time for the non-major-label mammals to start fucking [Warren Ellis Streaming]
"When you know you're not going to sell more than ten thousand copies no matter what you do -- then you can do anything."

Barron's sees weak 02005 for Marvel [Reuters; Barron's Online is subscriber-only]
Marvel's two movies for the year, Elektra and Fantastic Four, are not seen as distinguishing against a slate of fantasy offerings including Batman Begins, the final Star Wars chapter, War Of The Worlds with Tom Cruise, etc. And we've already seen Fantastic Four- it was called The Incredibles. In fact, the general 'negative sentiment backdrop' about Marvel has turned so pessimistic of late (with shares down almost 10% and a huge number of shorts) that yesterday's Schaeffer's Daily Contrarian is beginning to sniff out Marvel as a contrarian play. Those shareholders want big growth every quarter, and we all knew that licensing/movie gold wasn't going to get squeezed out of each of Marvel's 1500 properties nor all in one year- but at least the company was able to survive that crushing debt.

Art comics publishers taking a beating because good art is scant and lots of art comics are crappy [Permanent Damage]
If a zombie comic is great/doesn't push the right buttons, it's just one good/bad zombie comic that doesn't elevate/doom the rest. But art comics are held to a higher group standard.

Spider-Man helps fight against cyberbullying [AP (Yahoo News)] [Westchester Journal News]
Because 'kids will listen to him' and 'he knows 'the web''. Neilalien saw a clip of the press conference announcing the 'the nation's first cyberbully summit' on the local news and the guy in the Spider-Man suit was good for a laugh. Unfortunately no pics accompany the news stories online yet.

The businessman who hosted the event, Peter Paul, has told federal authorities that it cost more than $1 million and that he had been surprised when he saw that most of the contributions were not reported... Paul, a former associate of famed comic book illustrator Stan Lee, has sued Rosen, Clinton, former President Bill Clinton, and the event's producer, Aaron Tonken, in Los Angeles Superior Court. He is represented by Judicial Watch, an advocacy group long at odds with the Clintons... Paul claims that he was encouraged to donate by promises of a future business relationship, which never materialized, with Bill Clinton. He alleged in his complaint that the defendants placed him at risk of prosecution by not reporting the donations.

Stan Lee writing about 'young pretty girl' Alexa, developing movie about bounty hunter Jay J. Armes [Pulse]
Tom Brevoort in the Comments: "Stan is doing FANTASTIC FOUR: THE END with John Romita Jr. for Marvel- a 48-page one-shot that should see print somewhere around November, if all goes well."

"Stretching Things" from FANTASTIC FEARS #5 (Jan. 1954)
"Avery and the Goblins" from THE THING #13 (Apr. 1954)
"Von Mohl vs. the Ants" from STRANGE SUSPENSE STORIES #20 (Aug. 1954)
"The Payoff" from STRANGE SUSPENSE STORIES #20 (Aug. 1954)
"What Happened" from OUT OF THIS WORLD #3 (Mar. 1957)
"The Supermen" from OUT OF THIS WORLD #3 (Mar. 1957)
"They Didn't Believe Him" from MYSTERIES OF UNKNOWN WORLDS #3 (Apr. 1957)
"A Forgotten World" from MYSTERIES OF UNKNOWN WORLDS #3 (Apr. 1957)
"The Man Who Could See Tomorrow" UNUSUAL TALES #7 (May 1957)
"The Man Who Painted on Air" from UNUSUAL TALES #7 (May 1957)
"The Flying Dutchman" from OUT OF THIS WORLD #4 (June 1957)
"Director of the Board" STRANGE SUSPENSE STORIES #33 (Aug. 1957)
"The Mirage" from MYSTERIES OF UNKNOWN WORLDS #5 (Oct. 1957)
"All Those Eyes" from OUT OF THIS WORLD #6 (Nov. 1957)
"Night of the Red Snow" from UNUSUAL TALES #9 (Nov. 1957)
"Free" from STRANGE SUSPENSE STORIES #35 (Dec. 1957)
"The Strange Case of Captain Fenton" from MYSTERIES OF UNKNOWN WORLDS #6 (Dec. 1957)
"The Most Terrible Fate" from OUT OF THIS WORLD #7 (Feb. 1958)
"The Cure-all" from OUT OF THIS WORLD #7 (Feb. 1958)
"Mystery Planet" from STRANGE SUSPENSE STORIES #36 (Mar. 1958)
"The Tenderfoot and the Outlaw" from BLACK FURY #17 (Jan. 1959)
"The Colt Born to Raise Trouble" from BLACK FURY #17 (Jan. 1959)
"The Shining Stallion" from BLACK FURY #17 (Jan. 1959)
"The Great Escape" from SPACE ADVENTURES #27 (Feb. 1959)
"A Living Doll" from OUT OF THIS WORLD #12 (Mar. 1959)
"With the Help of Hogar" from FANTASTIC GIANTS (Sept. 1966)

Strange #3

Synopsis
Clea fights off the baddies (with curved weapons reminiscent of the Pincers of Power) and gets the car, so she and Stephen escape the bar. She tells Stephen the creatures were "low-level walkers", and something one of the creeps said to him during the encounter suggests that they are from Hell. They drive to a nondescript alley and enter a building that's bigger on the inside than on the outside.

Wong is there for a reunion. He keeps checking the cheap watch Stephen gave him back in Tibet even though it's been long broken.

Wong introduces Stephen to the Ancient One, a small old bald Asian man in a golden three-piece suit who drinks bottled water and quotes Paul Simon lyrics, and the man Stephen met previously on the mountain in Tibet. The Ancient One can't cure his hands, but he can heal him, and offers Stephen a chance to help people again. He explains that the world we see is not the real world. They've been watching Doc for a long time because he's special. Most people live in a delusional cell of what they want to see, but a sorcerer sees and walks all the worlds of reality and in between.

As Strange leaves, the Ancient One touches his forehead, apparently opening Strange's third eye. Strange tells Wong he's wasting his time. Clea's suspicions that Strange isn't the one they're looking for are confirmed. Now is when we meet Baron Mordo, a student of the Ancient One who holds the door as Strange leaves ("The greatest students are given the lowest tasks. It encourages modesty.").

Now back out on his own, but with his third eye open, Stephen sees the world quite differently, as if he's Roddy Piper with the sunglasses from They Live: demons everywhere.

2. When Straczynski said that Dr. Strange should be more like the Matrix [Pulse interview 8/03] [Newsarama interview 8/04], wow, he wasn't kidding! This is the Matrix. The Ancient One is Morpheus. Clea is Trinity. Stephen is Neo. The whole real nature of reality stuff. The characters in this comic even look like their Matrix counterparts. Even the big room with the double stairs this issue is from the Matrix. It feels completely derivative.

3. Neilalien was very disappointed with the lame meeting between Stephen and the Ancient One. The reader can only agree with Stephen that the Ancient One's spiel is so weak and unconvincing. The Ancient One's been watching and waiting for years for the big opportunity to sell it and recruit the Chosen One, and the best he can come up with is ye olde Dancing Wu Li Masters quantum-physics-zen 'atoms are mostly empty space', 'what we see is just light hitting our eyes but it's not what's real', a Tardis building, and the walls disappearing to show a serene scene, which is from any movie with a scene inside a home of the future. Show, don't tell, right? Have the Ancient One show Doc the true nature of reality. And show the readers too, using the art of the comic book. Give us something, maybe shrinking him and Stephen down to have their chat while walking within the empty space inside atoms. Maybe have the Ancient One take Stephen to Hell (and not a fire-and-brimstone cliche one either) and show him the forces aligned against humanity. Let's see something, anything new or interesting to the reader that might be remotely convincing to Stephen. Let's have a fun mindfuck with this. We're in for three issues at $10.50 already, and this meeting just adds another unneeded cycle of encounters between all the players as Stephen sees more demons and then comes crawling back to the Ancient One.

4. This really undercuts Doc's original origin. Dr. Strange was originally about redemption. Now, Doc is preordained as The One. There's no choice if you're Chosen.

It's not so much anymore that Strange was just trying to fix that which wasn't broken- it's severely broken itself.

Fresh geek-hate-on-a-plate from proud we-who-dislike-comic-books member Virginia Heffernan, in her rant against the Alias season premiere [New York Times (has their "love affair with comics" ended already?)] [via Gawker]

Let's be honest. Many of us don't like comic books and have feigned interest in their jumpy bif-bam fighting scenes and the way they redeem loser guys, only to impress and minister to those loser guys. And now we can admit that while the redemption dynamic - little X-Men boys finding in their eccentricity and loneliness a superpower - is touching, there's nothing duller than listening to someone explain, in all seriousness, the Syndicate and the Shadow Force and the Hard Drive and the Plutonium Lance. And the characters: lame. One is good and the other is evil, and then one is evil pretending to be good, and then one is good pretending to be evil...

[I]f she [Jennifer Garner] beamed after the stunts and didn't look so solemn, she might come off like Lynda Carter in the old "Wonder Woman." And then we who dislike comic books could dismiss this show as silly without the least compunction.

Maybe a guy into superheroes once dumped her for being a television critic?

Eisner died Monday at Florida Medical Center in Lauderdale Lakes of complications from quadruple bypass heart surgery last month, according to Denis Kitchen, Eisner's agent and publisher for three decades.

An obituary of the innovative comic-page illustrator Will Eisner yesterday included an imprecise comparison in some copies between his character the Spirit and others, including Batman. Unlike Superman and some other heroes of the comics, Batman relied on intelligence and skill, not supernatural powers.

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